2024 Nautilus Book Silver Award Winner in Animals and Nature
"Walker’s writing is an invitation to travel along virtually with the peripatetic lone wolf through the heart of Alaska’s wilderness, an adventure not to be missed.."—Margaret Bauman, author of
The Cordova Times
Follow one wolf’s incredible journey 2,600 miles across Alaska and Canada
Offers remarkable insights into one of the most beloved, feared, and mysterious creatures
The Wanderer
is the first book ever to chart a wolf’s movements for an extended period of time, almost to the day. Award-winning author Tom Walker draws on unparalleled access to a research study of wolves in Alaska to share the story of Wolf 258, nicknamed "the Wanderer." Relying on a GPS collar that recorded the animal’s coordinates each day, biologists tracked Wolf 258 as he moved through the wilderness—-and, astonishingly, traveled more than 2600 miles in less than six months.
Through the lens of one wolf’s epic journey, Walker highlights connections to terrain, history, looming threats, and other animals. He recounts the animal’s compelling final months, while examining the broader complexity of the species’ struggle for survival.
explores not only the natural history of wolves but the relationship of people—Indigenous, pioneers and settlers, biologists, politicians—with this predator, shedding light on the long-established northern traditions of trapping and hunting, the tangled politics of wolf management, and how artificial borders fail to contain this iconic species.